The Curious Creator Podcast

Building a Music Career and Finding Your Path as an Entrepreneur in the Music Business | EP 16

Did you know that music and technology go hand-in-hand? In fact, most of what we know about the ‘music business’ today was ignited because of technology – and that’s exactly the topic me and Daria Gassanova discuss in episode 16 of The Curious Creator podcast.
If you don’t know by now, I am also a musician, so I’m highly fascinated with Daria’s background and how she managed to evolve through the intersection of her love of music, technology and of course, entrepreneurship. That’s exactly what we talk about, including:
- Daria’s journey from being a musician to an entrepreneur (music export Ukraine) and how it's led to her being a product manager Kobalt Music  - How social media platforms have changed the way the music industry discovers talent and what makes for a great discovery (from an A&R POV)- How to define and manage what being a successful independent musician is (songwriter, musician, artist, singer or music producer) and the approach indies should take when navigating the new music business- How important it is to follow your passion and how to integrate multiple interests and skills to find your Ikigai (your best self and calling)
If you’re an entrepreneurial creative (of any sort), this is a must-watch. Lots of interesting nuances to our conversation, and one I would gladly do again.
01:35 Daria's Background 02:41 Being a Product Manager06:16 Technology & Music Publishing08:37 Musical Roots and Inspirations11:06 Cultural Influence and Music15:27 Building a Fan Community19:20 The Business Side of Music23:26 The DIY vs. Major Label 30:40 Defining Success in the Music Industry36:48 Discovering Artists40:03 The Impact of TikTok and AI 50:10 Navigating Career Paths58:28 Embracing a Multifaceted Career
https://www.linkedin.com/in/daria-gassanova-a3b701124/https://www.kobaltmusic.com/
#musicindustry #musicbusiness #independentartist 

How AI will affect marketers, entrepreneurs and the economy (a data scientist/founder's perspective) | EP15

Episode 15 of the Curious Creator podcast is a raw/unfiltered discussion on the topics of Artificial Intelligence (how it's evolving), the journey of entrepreneurship (building a startup) and how creative production/analytics tools can help agencies and brands scale their performance marketing campaigns. Don't miss this one!
I'm kindly joined by two guests, (Ankuj Arora) and my co-host (Ja Yue).
Ankuj Arora - Founder of Morphiq and Ex-AI Lead at Smartly.io  
Ja Yue - Performance Marketing Leader and Consultant
This is a refreshing episode for me, as it's my first physical podcast episode (which I definitely prefer over remote recordings), and I get to ask burning questions related to the intersection of AI and marketing. If you're still not sold, here are other topics we discuss:
- When will AI have consciousness and be fully autonomous- How Ankuj became a Data Scientist coming from a Computer Science background- His lessons and takeaway from going through various accelerators and building a SaaS startup- Anukj's experience at Smartly.io and how it influenced his new ventures
00:00 Intro (Mini vlog)01:51 Meet Ankuj and Ja05:57 Evolution of AI and Data Science11:45 OpenAI's Impact 19:51 The Consciousness Debate31:39 Explaining AI to Non-Technical Audiences34:00 Smartly & Creative Intelligence42:49 Introducing Morphiq46:48 The Vision Behind Morphiq52:12 Value Proposition of AI in Analytics54:16 Transparency and Trust in AI Systems57:34 Morphiq's Situation01:01:04 Bootstrapping vs VC01:14:54 Lessons from Entrepreneur First01:26:45 Pitching Morphiq to Agencies and Clients01:30:39 Media Buyers and Creative Teams01:33:57 AI's Role in Creative Production and Media02:03:51 Personal Reflections 
Shownotes
https://www.linkedin.com/in/ankuj-arora-ph-d-94777421/https://www.linkedin.com/in/jayue/https://morphiq.xyz/ https://www.smartly.io/ https://www.joinef.com/
#AI #Entrepreneurship #SaaS 

Marina Krivonossova On How To Humanise Your B2B Content Marketing Strategy | EP 14

In this episode, we interview Marina Krivonossova, founder of the B2B content marketing agency Retold. Marina shares her unique journey from a STEM-oriented upbringing to becoming a successful content marketer and entrepreneur in the Netherlands. She discusses the challenges of breaking into marketing, the importance of human-led content, and her approach to leveraging generative AI. Listen in as Marina offers valuable advice for aspiring marketers and shares her experiences living and working in Europe.
CHAPTERS
00:00 Trailer01:19 Introduction01:37 Marina's Journey03:16 Traveling in Europe04:49 Path to Marketing09:58 Human-Led Marketing12:16 Founding Retold17:16 Content Marketing for B2B20:33 Navigating Social Media 24:49 Generating Content Ideas 38:13 Final Thoughts
#B2BContentMarketing #HumantoHumanMarketing #B2BSaaS
🎥 Subscribe to the Channel: https://bit.ly/4chHYBD💎 Become a Futurist Marketer: https://futurist-marketers.pro/🤳 Want to contribute content? https://www.futurist-marketers.pro/contact🎮 All Our Gear (Affiliate Links): https://kit.co/jonathanmilanes🙏 Support the Platform: https://bit.ly/3yBKRPI💡 My LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonathanmilanes/🚀 Need a Performance Marketing Agency? https://proverve.io/

Matt Burns On Why Communities are the Next Big Frontier in Modern Marketing | EP 13

In this episode, we delve into the future of marketing and community building with Matt Burns, former first employee of monday.com and current founder of Digital Gravity. Matt shares his insights on the intrinsic relationship between marketing and community, the importance of building trust and connections, and the evolving role of AI in shaping our informational landscape. Learn about effective strategies for building and maintaining communities, the significance of having a mission and values, and how to create meaningful human connections in a digital age. Whether you're a marketer looking to elevate your community-building efforts or simply interested in the future of digital interactions, this episode is packed with valuable takeaways.
Chapters
00:00 Trailer01:15 Introduction03:25 The Importance of Trust05:53 Defining Community Building09:51 Small, Intentional Communities17:51 Start Your Own Community20:20 Offline and Online Communities 34:58 Pricing Strategies 42:24 Building a Community01:00:03 Mission and Values01:15:35 Future Predictions
#circlecommunity #skool #communitybuilding
🎥 Subscribe to the Channel: https://bit.ly/4chHYBD💎 Become a Futurist Marketer: https://futurist-marketers.pro/🤳 Want to contribute content? https://www.futurist-marketers.pro/contact🎮 All Our Gear (Affiliate Links): https://kit.co/jonathanmilanes🙏 Support the Platform: https://bit.ly/3yBKRPI💡 My LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonathanmilanes/🚀 Need a Performance Marketing Agency? https://proverve.io/

Maxim Tanevskiy on Advanced Sales Techniques for B2B SaaS Startups & Finding GTM Efficiency | EP12

The Futurist Marketers pod is back! Our guest for EP12 is Maxim Tanevskiy - he is currently the Chief Business Officer at Ex-human and is a GTM/Sales Expert. I’m personally excited for you lovely people to watch it, especially knowing that sales is a must-have skill (always has been!).
Topics we talk about include:
- Turning your sales approach into a revenue system (especially in the B2B SaaS context)- The differences and nuances between a salesperson and a business development representative (and why the other may be valuable)- How Maxim learning Mandarin (Chinese), helped him close a 7-figure deal (and how to approach working with clients from different cultures)- His predictions in the world of sales + AI BDRs/SDRs (including the potentiality of AI committees)- Finding out your GTM efficiency, growth rate and how to engineer a GTM sales process- Everything from social selling to empathetic conversational AI and more.
As always, enjoy the show and share the session with your friends/network (they’ll find this show valuable, I promise).
Chapters
01:03 Introduction 01:45 Travel and Work Lifestyle05:40 Sales vs. Business Development06:19 Evolution of Sales Tech13:52 Building a Revenue System26:18 Chinese Language and Culture32:02 Leveraging Language Skills in Sales33:02 Cultural Nuances in Business 35:35 Scaling B2B SaaS Startups37:10 Importance of Market Size and Product-Market Fit43:23 Challenges and Lessons in Sales49:01 The Role of AI in Sales53:25 Sales Techniques and Personal Development59:29 Closing Thoughts
Reference Links
https://exh.ai/#home https://www.linkedin.com/in/maxim-tanevskiy/https://www.linkedin.com/company/s-strategy/https://www.apollo.io/https://meddicc.com/meddic-sales-qualification-and-frameworks Never Split the Difference Book (Affiliate Link): https://amzn.to/4hqILTv

Digital Marketing Measurement in 2025: Chris Mercer on Data Strategy and Customer Behaviours | EP11

Digital marketing measurement is a topic that’s mostly kept under wraps, especially when you have opposing perspectives on the matter. The subject extends into so many areas from data strategy to data analysis and user behaviour/psychology, that getting strong conclusions is always tricky.
In episode 11 of the podcast, I talk with Chris Mercer, who has been in the field of digital marketing measurement for 13+ years and is the founder of Measurement Marketing and Profit School.
In the episode, we discuss all things digital marketing measurement, data analysis, funnels and much more including:
- The importance of strategy over marketing measurement tools (software)
- How information is becoming a commodity and the untapped power of community and a strong brand to alleviate the drove of AI content coming our way in 2025 (if not already)
- The framework he uses when thinking about digital marketing measurement and data: 1) acquire 2) store 3) visualise 4) understand
- The launch of his community and how it can help marketers upskill in data measurement and analysis
- How data should be seen as a conversation between a customer (the user) and our website/mobile app + how to respond to this
Enjoy the podcast and if you’ve found value, help your peers and repost/share it 👌
Chapters
00:00 Introduction
01:57 Measure Summit Event
07:10 Evolution of Measure Summit
08:13 The Importance of Competitor Collaboration
10:15 Mercer's Journey into Digital Marketing
12:38 Shift to Conversion Optimization
17:28 Measurement Strategy
20:44 Understanding User Behavior
27:06 The Importance of Measuring User Behavior
27:54 Essential Tools
34:48 Challenges in Digital Tools
42:17 Predictions
48:09 Closing Thoughts
#DigitalMarketing #DataAnalysis #DigitalMarketingMeasurement
Show Notes
https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrismerceronline/
https://measurementmarketing.io/
https://my.measureu.com/feed
https://profitschool.com/
https://measuresummit.com/
https://clarity.microsoft.com/
https://tagmanager.google.com
https://developers.google.com/analytics
https://www.kissmetrics.io/
https://lookerstudio.google.com/u/0/navigation/reporting
https://www.linkedin.com/in/julianjuenemann/
https://www.linkedin.com/company/measureschool/about/
https://measureschool.com/
🎥 Subscribe to the Channel: https://bit.ly/4chHYBD
💎 Become a Futurist Marketer: https://futurist-marketers.pro/
🙏 Support the Platform: https://bit.ly/3yBKRPI
🎧 Listen to the Podcast: https://pod.link/1756442938
📚 Join the Newsletter: https://newsletter.futurist-marketers.pro/
💡 My LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonathanmilanes/
🐥 My Twitter (X): https://twitter.com/jonathanmilanes
🚀 If you need a Growth/Performance Marketing Consultant: https://proverve.io/
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The Importance of Personal Projects as a Candidate: Kate O’Shea on The Process of Recruitment | EP10

16+ years of experience in recruiting for digital marketers and performance marketers (paid media).
That’s the reason why I wanted to have Kate O'Shea on the podcast - it always fascinates me what happens during the end-to-end process of recruitment and what makes a candidate stand out. That’s just one of the many high-impact conversations we had, and now it’s available for you.
In episode 10, we discuss:
✅ What the market is like in 2024, and how it compares to last year and how it may be in the 2025/the future
✅ Why Q1 of the year tends to be a great time to change roles and look for new opportunities
✅ Red flags you do during your screening process that turn recruiters off
✅ Why having personal projects outside of your main day job is a must for standing out in a pile of CVs (hey, I’ve preaching this since day one)
✅ Why it is important to be transparent and to be clear from both the employer's and candidate's perspective
Please do enjoy the podcast 🙏
PS. If you’ve found (or finding) value in any of the content Futurist Marketers produces, please do repost it to your network and let’s share the knowledge 👌
#Recruitment #MarketingRecruitment #DigitalMarketing #JobSearch #CareerAdvice #JobInterview #HiringTips #MarketingJobs
00:00 Trailer
01:56 Current Market Trends and Predictions
08:31 The Recruitment Process: End-to-End
15:14 Managing Expectations in Recruitment
22:24 Salary Negotiations and Final Steps
24:51 The Importance of Transparency in Hiring
26:11 What Makes a Great Initial Interview
29:57 Red Flags in the Hiring Process
34:16 Building Your Personal Brand
36:13 Advice for Job Seekers
42:56 The Future of Recruitment
Shownotes
https://www.linkedin.com/in/kateppc/
https://www.linkedin.com/company/keo-digital-ltd/
https://techcrunch.com/
https://www.crunchbase.com/

The Value of Soft Skills & Constant Learning: Alain Abou-Atmeh on Digital & Growth Marketing | EP9

Why soft skills are needed in an age of AI and automation.
That’s one of the topics I and Alain Abou-Atmeh talk about in episode 9 of the podcast - but there’s more, we also dive in on:
✅ The challenges of being a marketer when you’re doing multiple roles at the same time
✅ The core difference between digital marketing and growth marketing (goldmine mental model here!)
✅ How he combines marketing fundamentals and integrates it with AI usage (practical example shown if you listen)
✅ What makes Growth Tribe different when it comes to what they teach and the value of showing practical use cases for what they teach
✅ Some aspects of self-development and continuous learning in times of high competition
Please do enjoy the podcast 🙏
PS. If you’ve found (or finding) value in any of the content Futurist Marketers produces, please do repost it to your network and let’s share the knowledge 👌
#Growth #GrowthMarketing #DigitalMarketing #GrowthTribe #PersonalDevelopment
00:00 Trailer
02:20 Freelancing to Growth Tribe
09:20 The Role of Soft Skills
21:12 Teaching Growth Marketing
23:56 Growth Marketing in Real-World Scenarios
26:19 The Power of AI in Marketing
28:02 The Importance of Fundamentals in Marketing
29:10 Challenges in Growth Marketing
34:50 Favorite Growth Marketing Tools
38:47 Continuous Learning and Staying Updated
42:09 The T-Shaped Marketer
Show notes
https://www.linkedin.com/in/growthmarketingtrainer/
https://www.crystalknows.com/
https://sparktoro.com/
https://www.semrush.com/
https://www.lyssna.com/
https://www.stackedmarketer.com/
https://feedly.com/
https://www.howtoweb.co/
https://growthtribe.io/
Be Water, My Friend - https://amzn.to/3A6wdkv (affiliate link)
How to win friends and influence people - https://amzn.to/40mqhhF (affiliate link)
The Laws of Human Nature - https://amzn.to/3YDMWVF (affiliate link)
Hacking Growth - https://amzn.to/3C1ovIN (affiliate link)
https://growwithward.com/aaarrr-pirate-funnel/

How Growth Leaders Thrive in Times of Change: Andrew Capland on Coaching Head of Growths | EP8

Misalignments and pain points of being a growth leader (expect the unexpected).
One of the many touch points I geeked out on with episode 8 of the podcast with my guy Andrew Capland (of Delivering Value). We also talk about:
✅ What a growth leader/head of growth actually is and why it’s a growing need for most businesses
✅ The common pain points, challenges and situations you’ll likely face as a growth leader
✅ His approach to mentoring and coaching Head of Growths and why it’s such a high-pressure role (and what to do about it)
✅ Why companies shouldn’t even think about hiring a head of growth without product-market-fit (110% agree with this!)
✅ Ways to alleviate misalignment and comms issues with cross-functional teams
Please do enjoy the podcast 🙏
PS. If you’ve found (or finding) value in any of the content Futurist Marketers produces, please do repost it to your network and let’s share the knowledge 👌
#Growth #HeadofGrowth #Leadership #GrowthLeadership #Reforge #GrowthMarketing
00:00 Introduction and Setting the Stage
01:04 Guest Introduction: Andrew Kaplan
01:59 Andrew's Journey into Marketing
03:55 Transition to Growth Leadership
06:13 Coaching Heads of Growth
11:17 Advice for Aspiring Growth Leaders
21:22 Challenges and Misalignment in Growth Roles
30:47 Future of Product-Led Growth
Shownotes
https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewcapland/
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPZVQP9ncHoTDgt-kz4m57A
https://deliveringvalue.co/
https://www.hubspot.com/
https://deliveringvalue.co/coaching
https://wistia.com/
https://www.productled.org/foundations/what-is-product-led-growth
https://www.reforge.com/
https://productled.com/

Mobile App Marketing: Steve Young on Building the #1 ASO Agency and Scaling Niche Apps l | EP7

The #1 YouTube channel on App Store Optimisation & Mobile App Growth.
That’s what our podcast guest Steve P. Young has built AppMasters - he also runs an agency that helps app companies scale their growth the ‘right’ way, without burning cash.
In episode 7 of the podcast, we talk about:
✅ How his entrepreneurial ventures led to helping other app marketers and app developers in their growth goals
✅ His approach to building @appmasters and how he built one of the top YT channels for app marketers/developers
✅ A growth ‘hack’ to identify demand for an app idea without having to build a single line of code OR prior to launching it (derisking)
✅ The power of content marketing and how that can funnel onto exciting projects like building a business, building your personal brand and more
✅ Why having a conversion optimisation approach is more important than traditional user acquisition/paid media efforts when growing a mobile app (hint: leaky buckets)
Please do enjoy the podcast 🙏
#AppMasters #ASO #AppStoreOptimisation #MobileAppMarketing #UserAcquisition
00:00 Trailer
01:21 Building a YouTube Channel
03:04 Background and Early Career
04:19 Starting the Podcast and App Masters
07:06 App Marketing Strategies
17:30 The Future of App Marketing
21:47 Advice for Aspiring Marketers
25:26 Favorite Tools for ASO
Shownotes
https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevepyoung/
https://www.youtube.com/appmasters
https://appmasters.com/
https://appfollow.io/
https://appradar.com/
https://designpickle.com/
https://www.videohusky.com/